In general, construction heavy equipment such as excavators and cranes is widely used in industrial sites, particularly, construction sites. Since an environment in which the construction heavy equipment is used is exposed to a number of risk factors, persons who operate the heavy equipment need to pay particular attention. The reason is that a probability that safety accidents will occur when the person does not pay particular attention is higher than in other industrial field.
Therefore, a plurality of methods is not only taken into account to prevent workers from being subjected to a safety accident while working as described above and to allow the workers to efficiently perform work, but also actually carried out.
One of the methods which are actually carried out is to control an operation of the construction heavy equipment from the outside instead of allowing the worker to get directly in the construction heavy equipment and then to perform work. That is, the method of making the construction heavy equipment unmanned.
In the related art, there are broadly two methods of remotely manipulating the construction heavy equipment in an unmanned manner.
First, as a convertible type, the existing mechanical hydraulic apparatuses are replaced by electro-hydraulic apparatuses so as to remotely manipulate a system itself, and various types of control apparatuses are mounted to control the electro-hydraulic apparatuses.
Second, as a mountable type, a manipulator in the form of a robotic arm is mounted in the existing construction heavy equipment so as to manipulate an operation lever, or a robot such as a humanoid robot is seated in the existing construction heavy equipment instead of the manipulator so as to manipulate the operation lever.
However, in the case of the first-mentioned unmanned control method in a convertible type, there are problems in that it is complicated because of having to completely change the existing mechanical apparatuses to new electro-hydraulic apparatuses, thus the existing system cannot be used, and there is a limitation to the type and the number of applicable apparatuses.
In addition, in the case of the second-mentioned unmanned control method in a mountable type, there are problems in that it is difficult to develop and mount the manipulator or the humanoid robot for manipulating the operation lever, and expensive actuators are required to implement the structure. In addition, there is a problem in that it is difficult for a worker to directly carry the manipulator or the humanoid robot.
Therefore, there is an acute need for development of an unmanned control system with a new structure, which is capable of being applicable to the existing system, being easily portable, and enabling the apparatus such as the heavy equipment to be accurately manipulated remotely from the outside of the apparatus.
To solve the existing problems, the present applicant has proposed Korean Patent Publication No. 10-2011-0074041. However, in the case of the unmanned control system disclosed in the Patent Publication No. 10-2011-0074041, a mountable operation unit is mounted above an operation lever, and as a result, there is spatial restriction when a driver manually operates the operation lever in a state in which the mountable operation unit is mounted. In addition, since the mountable operation unit is positioned above the operation lever, a center of gravity of the operation unit is located above the operation lever, and as a result, there is a limitation in that the operation lever cannot be accurately controlled. In addition, in a case in which the mountable operation unit is attached to the operation lever of the apparatus, the worker may remotely perform work, but there is a problem in that it is difficult for the worker to get in the apparatus and then perform work because of a problem with a volume of the operation unit. Furthermore, due to a problem with a method in which the mountable operation unit is mounted on the operation lever of the apparatus, there are problems in that a large amount of time is needed to mount the operation unit, mechanical mechanisms are complicated, and motion of the operation lever is difficult to be intuitively determined.